Pátio Dom Fradique

The Pátio Dom Fradique is located in the backyard of a former palace that has direct connection with the Castelo de São Jorge, one of the most touristic areas in Lisbon. It consists of former housing units, now in ruins, through four elevation levels. After changing owners several times, the Pátio Dom Fradique is now property of the Municipality of Lisbon. The old palace has been remodeled into one of the most expensive hotels in the city center.

Truck

Ice Cream

Mapping

Street art

06/2014

Nowadays, the access to the Pátio is granted through the hotel gate in the southwest side and through a metal gate in the northeast side that closes at night. This complex urban situation is further emphasized by the fact that the patio is mostly being used as the private backyard of the hotel and that it is part of one of the most touristic routes in Lisbon.

The goal of Frame Colectivo’s intervention, in this case, was to promote the Pátio Dom Fradique to what it actually is: a public space. As part of the project Pátio Ambulante, the team contacted the association FAS, already active in the neighborhood of Castelo, and co-curated a cultural program open to the public. Frame Colectivo’s activities included the Translucid Stencil Tiles (hyperlink), workshops of mask theater and of solar ovens, an exchange market, open-air cinema sessions, and a performance of AHOI! by Theatre Fragile (hyperlink).

Even for a short period of time, the use of the patio changed due to the urban furniture the team installed. People were able to sit down, have a rest, and enjoy the shadow of the trees and the amazing view from both the river and the ruins. During the workshops, many visitors shared personal stories and had the chance to discuss the touristification of the neighborhood.

Abstraction, pause, balance, marking, movement, resistance, adaptation. These were some of the key elements defining the conceptualization of the scenography for Paula Diogo´s piece “About remembering and forgetting” dealing with collective and individual memories.

Four trapezoidal tables and one vertical structure in wood and aluminum were designed and built to meet the needs of the performance play “Triste in English from Spanish” by portuguese choreographer Sónia Batista.

“Will the sea swallow the 2º Torrão? When? How?” Assuming this question as a starting point, presented from the residents of the settlement of 2º Torrão, the participatory scientific project “Novos Decisores Ciêncies” investigates the coastal erosion. Frame Colectivo participated in the 2017 edition proposing the construction of three meeting places.

Invited by O Nosso Km2, Frame Colectivo projected and built a leisure park in the neighborhood of Santos ao Rêgo (Rua Marciano Henriques da Silva). We moved into an empty shop in the ground level of number 32 of the same street, using the space as office and storage.

The short film 767 follows the itinerary of the 767 bus of Carris from Campo Mártires da Pátria to the subway station of Reboleira. We created a darkroom in the back of the fire truck and did the same path behind the bus.

We were invited by the project O Banquete (festival to think and eat) to create a set design in public space for an outdoor iteration of the festival with high school students. For the open call CRIAR LISBOA, we developed the project Acute Strawberries for the Miradouro do Monte Agudo (viewpoint), attempting to create a space for dialogue and promoting discussion about healthy eating in the urban context. We proposed the creation of a decontextualized hydroponic strawberry plantation that would offer shade and a new landscape for the viewpoint.

The proposal of the Studio Maria Curraleira is a pilot project for the creation of a multimedia production studio in Vale de Chelas. As an open local platform, it aims to accompany the digital collection of local narratives that describe the history and the daily life of the former Curraleira neighborhood, thus promoting social cohesion.

Frame Colectivo was invited by Festival TODOS – Caminhada de Culturas 2015 to organize a series of open-air building workshops. These workshops transformed the garden in Campo Mártires da Pátria into a living room for all to enjoy.

The curatorial line of this exhibition aimed both at presenting to a broader public the results of the project Performapping, realized throughout May 2015 in squares, vilas operárias and viewpoints in Penha de França, and to redefine the entrance of the Espaço da Penha as a semi-public community space.

The project Performapping resulted as a series of experimental activities focusing on the research of the socio-cultural urban reality in the parish of Penha de França. Together with a team of activists, anthropologists, and performers, we engaged in various forms of mapping, video art, photography, and installation. Questions of identification, collaboration in the decision-making of public space, and social dynamics between community entities guided the interventions throughout the project.

During our research in the Vale de Santo António area, we set a specific focus on Vila Cândida, a social housing unit from the early 20th century. This complex is located in a difficult topographic setting with great altitude variations. Of particular importance were the entrance situation, defined by two concrete columns and a vacant lot, and a community space that was destroyed by a car accident.

The project The Other Side of the Wall raises questions about the stigmatization of the Health Park, former Júlio de Matos Hospital, and about the urban isolation due to the wall built around it. Accepting an invitation by the Coruchéus Public Library to participate in the Dias de Bem Cá Estar, Frame Colectivo, in partnership with Rádio Aurora, focused on developing strategies for the inclusion of the public space of the Health Park in the Alvalade neighborhood.

In collaboration with the Institut Français Portugal and the Goethe-Institut Portugal, Frame Colectivo invited Theatre Fragile to perform the piece AHOI! during three episodes of Pátio Ambulante in September 2014. The productions of this company mix drama with documentary theatre using masks, performative paths, documentary, and fiction. In this context, Street Theatre acts as a facilitator in public space, enabling the meeting of a wide range of people, and transforming urban spaces into a stage.

During a workshop in July 2014, the Association EDA (Ensaios e Diálogos) and the municipalities of Trafaria and Costa da Caparica collaborated to create the furniture for the Trafaria Library. Located in the central square of the small fishing village, the library disposes of a former office space on the first floor next to the local market. Due to the success of the activities, the project expanded to the ground floor reusing an abandoned shop as a cultural space in 2015.

Vertical Gardens is a proposal for Lisbon’s Participatory Budget 2014 that offers an alternative concept for the many semi-destroyed buildings belonging to the Municipality of Lisbon. Deriving from studies that demonstrate the positive effect of vertical vegetation in the cities and the need for urban requalification, the project focuses on the dismounting part of the already destroyed fronts, leaving only the raw structure of the building, including basic infrastructure like water and electricity systems.

Open Patio was the launching event of Pátio Ambulante. It took place at the Pátio of São João in the Santana hill, in September 2013. This private space was temporarily transformed, opening its doors with a diversified cultural program created in collaboration with the resident population.

It all started in Moabit, Berlin. We focused on the Arminius Markthalle, a market from 1890, and worked from a small office inside the building researching participation methods for its revitalization. We learned so much from the flexibility and the endless possibilities offered by the structural cast iron frames of the market, that we integrated the concept as our guiding principle. Frame Colectivo was born!